Sports betting Drama - Not just for bookies anymore!

Congratulations Spurs 2007 NBA CHAMPIONS

The NBA 2007 series are finally over, and after a breath taking final game, the score resulted in the San Antonio Spurs winning their 4th NBA Title against the Cleveland Cavaliers last Thursday; their 4th title in 9 yrs.

A complete soap opera: Lebron becomes a father in the morning while his team is swept out of the finals. Tony Parker becomes MVP for the 2007NBA finals and he also gets the girl as he is officially engaged to Latina beauty Eva Longoria.

And with all that drama, the perfect mood was set for one of the most enjoyable times of the year for me to end this past Thursday. The NBA finals simply give me that mid-year excitement that I need to get through the rest of the year…But; I still have some other exciting sports betting events to watch, including all the drama, misfortune, passion and betrayal worthy of a tv reality show or a Sopranos episode, only in sports, the cast gets paid much more and have to sweat a whole lot as well. Here’s my list of what’s hot this week on sports betting:

MLB Baseball:

…“Take me out to the ball game, Take me out with the crowd. Buy me some steroids and Cracker Jack, I don't care if I never get back or if I get santioned by the League”…

Oh sorry, that’s not how the lyrics went?

Right...well..., the point is Jason Giambi has until Thursday to agree to a meeting with steroids investigator George Mitchell or could possibly suffer disciplinary actions from baseball commissioner Bud Selig due to admitting his use of steroids and other performance-enhancing substances. This scandal in which the Yankees player has been involved recently along with Barry Bonds from the San Francisco Giants is really a serious matter. Although I believe he’s spoken to the media and apologized several times and really seems to want to put the matter behind him as much as possible, there could be serious repercutions. In the case of Greg Anderson who was Bonds' former trainer he has been convicted and currently serves time in jail for perjury, fraud charges and for failing to cooperate with a grand jury. Did you think baseball wasn't exciting enough? Anyone? I’ll keep you posted on how this unfolds.

NASCAR:

The intimidators’ (Dale Earnhardt Sr.) life is being portrayed on a movie called DALE sponsored by Nascar, GMC and CMT films and will be racing into AMC theaters on July 19th all over the US for fans to reminisce on the life and achievements of this passionate driver(http://www.cmt.com/movies/dale/ ). All this while in a controversial decision, Dale Earnhardt Jr. has declared he is leaving behind his fathers’ company, his legendary number 8, the emblematic red uniform and of course the sponsorship of beer giant “Budweiser “. He will be running with Hendrick Motorsports from now on and subsequently this turn of events Kyle Busch NASCAR's has almost immediately become the Most-Sought Free Agent in Nascar as he will be leaving his former team.

This has been one of the most controversial moves ever in Nascar's history . The fans are still so vulnerable regarding his fathers’ death and seeing Dale Earnhardt Jr. just move on like that on to better horizons might just hit their loyalty in the nuts. On the other hand, if Busch has a vision, he’ll seize this opportunity and here is where you can be witnessing the birth of two legendary rivals that will define things on the speedway. Kind of reminds me of Venom and Spiderman but that’s only me.

That's all that's exciting this week on my sports betting agenda, but, then again I've been really busy getting over a wild weekend... I mean, I've been busy working a lot. :)

Sources:

http://www.niehs.nih.gov/kids/lyrics/ballgame.htm
http://my.nba.com/forum.jspa?forumID=300005152
http://www.bradenton.com/462/story/78991.html
http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20070620005822&newsLang=en

MLB's Ryan Freels suffers outrageous collision

I am going crazy here looking for a video of Ryan Freel’s collision today. Did you see that?

Freel collided strepitously against teammate Norris Hopper after trying to catch a “fly” by Humberto Cota at the start of the inning. Unbelievebably enough he did catch it and the Reds did win this game against the Pittsburg Pirates after all. Even Hopper was able to continue playing. But Freel knocked himself unconscious, crumbled down strepitously and laid on the field for 13 scary minutes.

Paramedics took Ryan Freel out the field in stretcher after examining him and left everyone speechless and fearing the worst. Luckily, according to recent news, the team announced he regained the feeling in his legs and was able to speak coherently discarding any important brain damage that might have impaired him permanently.

This 31 yr. old fielder could’ve died today in such a nasty collision. He is still hospitalized and obviously suffered contusions to his head and neck and I might add myself it is a true miracle how he’s not seriously injured. It would’ve been definitely a dreadful moment in sports.

But this comes as no surprise: Ryan Freel has been dubbed as ‘reckless and dangerous’ in the field. He’s outdone himself before on the catches: Quoting Mark Sheldon from Reds.com here’s a description of one of his famous crazy catches …“Mind-bending catch: Not surprisingly, right fielder Ryan Freel's spectacular diving catch on the warning track Tuesday night vs. St. Louis remained a buzzworthy topic Wednesday. It was also prominently featured on television highlight shows”...

It is ironic to think that Freel himself was the go-to-guy whenever the injury-ridden Reds in 2004 needed him as an emergency backup catcher and he was always up to the task. It is now Ken Griffey Jr.’s turn to replace him, while Freel recovers.

Not a very lucky guy I’d say. Or maybe he is. If this scares him enough it might even be a life turning event. Remember Ryan Freel is the same guy who was arrested twice for DUI charges in 1 year and told the police he was ‘unemployed’ when pulled over. He got away by paying a $250.00 bond. Maybe he’ll quit drinking or quit sports. I wouldn’t do either, but it was just a suggestion.

Sources:

http://redlegnation.com/2005/03/03/ryan-freel-is-a-sub/feed/

http://espndeportes.espn.go.com/news/story?id=562973&s=bei&type=story

http://cincinnati.reds.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060809&content_id=1601043&vkey=news_cin&fext=.jsp&c_id=cin

http://www.red-hot-mama.com/humanleague.php?id=C0_23_3